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|A. O. SCOTT

Warning: Plot Summary Ahead

Looking back at my previous post, I realize I may have failed to convey the special qualities of "To Paint or Make Love." Therefore, it may be useful to append a plot summary, with the warning that if you plan to see this movie someday, you may not wish to read it. On the other hand, after reading it, you may be eager to see the film. Chacun à son gout.

A middle-aged couple  he's just taken early retirement as some kind of meteorologist, she's an amateur painter  buy a quaint, rundown farmhouse in the country. They befriend the mayor of the nearest village, who is blind, and his beautfiul young wife. The mayor's name is Adam, the wife is Eve. Then the mayor's house burns down and he and his wife move in with the first couple, and they swap spouses. (The blind guy initiates it by pretending to mistake the other guy's wife for his own. After dinner he takes her hand and says, "shall we go upstairs to bed?" and she does, leaving her husband to enjoy the mayor's wife on the couch. All very tastefully and discreetly filmed, bien sur.) This causes a bit of awkwardness, so the mayor and his wife end up moving to Tahiti, but then the other couple's daughter comes back from Italy with a Brazilian guy she's going to marry, so the mayor and his wife come back for the wedding, after which all four of them (but not the daughter and the Brazilian guy, thank God) all get it on together. So the metereologist and his wife decide, reasonably enough, to move to Tahiti with the others, and they stay behind to sell both houses. (The one that had burned down has been reconstructed thanks to a speedy payment from the insurance company.) Adam and Eve's house sells right away, and then one evening a couple drives up to look at the other place, admires it, stays for dinner, and then has a foursome with the meteorologist and his wife. Upon reflection, these two decide not to move to Tahiti after all, but to remain in the picturesque French countryside, sleeping with other couples who happen by to admire the scenery and check out the real estate.